Britain's top tabloid urges exit from European Union

The Sun urged readers to vote to leave the European Union with the headline, "BeLeave in Britain."

Photo: Luke MacGregor, Stringer

LONDON - Rupert Murdoch's Sun tabloid, Britain's most popular, came out on Tuesday in favor of a British exit from the European Union, as a series of opinion polls suggested that the campaign to leave the bloc is picking up support, inducing anxiety in the financial markets and in No. 10 Downing Street.

The country will decide the issue through a referendum June 23, and there is a growing sense on both sides that the early confidence of those who support remaining in the EU has given way to recognition that the vote could go either way, with historic consequences for Britain and the Continent.

Measuring public opinion has been difficult, both because of problems plaguing pollsters everywhere and because there is no sure way to compare this referendum with previous votes. Although different polls using different methodologies have found widely varying levels of support for staying or going, established pollsters have generally given the edge to those favoring remaining in the EU.

But after a push by the "leave" campaign and its allies focusing on immigration and Islamist radicalism, including the possibility that Turkey and its 77 million Muslims might one day join the EU, the polls are showing signs of a shift.

A respected "poll of polls," averaging voting intentions in the previous six major polls, now shows the "leave" campaign with a lead of two percentage points, 51 to 49. As recently as three weeks ago the "remain" camp held a 10 percentage point lead, 55 to 45. The "poll of polls" is directed by John Curtice, professor of politics at Strathclyde University and a senior fellow at NatCen, an independent social research institution.

A similar aggregation of polls by The Financial Times also shows the "leave" campaign with a two percentage point advantage, 47 to 45.

Three polls released on Monday, including online and telephone polls, all showed the "leave" campaign with leads inside the polls' margins of sampling error. Two Guardian/ICM polls - one conducted using traditional telephone sampling of voters, the other based on an online survey - both found the "leave" campaign with a six percentage point advantage, 53 to 47.

Bookmakers are also showing an increased probability of a British exit, or Brexit, with Betfair putting the probability of leaving at 42 percent, compared with 25 on Friday.

But at the moment, despite the narrowing odds, bettors and many investment banks still think the "remain" camp will win.

On the news of the polls, the pound fell by more than a cent to $1.41, while a measure based on the cost of insurance options taken to protect investors against movement in the pound over the next month jumped to a record high.

If the polls are accurate, they suggest the urgency of the efforts by Prime Minister David Cameron, who is leading the charge for staying in the EU, as the campaign heads into its final week and any undecided voters make up their minds.

The Sun is Murdoch's flagship, and he decides its editorial policy, its editors say. In a front-page editorial under the headline "BeLEAVE in Britain," the tabloid argues that staying in the EU would be "worse for immigration, worse for jobs, worse for wages and worse for our way of life."